Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Ladka Ladki Ek Barabar? Gender Ideology Among Young Adolescents Through Adulthood in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Transforming Unequal Gender Relations in India and Beyond

Part of the book series: Sustainable Development Goals Series ((SDGS))

  • 167 Accesses

Abstract

Institutional and cultural norms, particularly in developing countries, are such that women typically have access to less resources and face discrimination right from their birth (in some instances, even before their birth) to death. Such norms tend to be sticky and are not easily dismantled with modernization or economic progress. To be able to meet the goals of gender equity as articulated in Sustainable Development Goal 5, it is essential to gain a deeper understanding of these gender norms. It is against this backdrop that we examine gender ideology among young adolescents in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh using the two waves (2015–16 and 2018) of the UDAYA data by the Population Council. Specifically, we ask the following questions: What is the gender ideology of adolescents in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh? Is there a difference in ideology between young (10–14 years) and old (15–19 years) adolescents? Do boys and girls have different gender ideologies? How do religion, caste, class, and location along with the adolescent’s family of origin mediate the construction of gender? We draw on intersectional and life course perspective  theoretical frameworks and employ multivariate regression technique for our analysis.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 109.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Goal 5 of the 2030 Agenda of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is as follows “Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls”.

  2. 2.

    https://www.projectudaya.in/about-udaya/.

References

  1. Inglehart R, Norris P. Rising tide: gender equality and cultural change around the world. Cambridge University Press; 2003. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/rising-tide/E28A6E8662971242917902E0A7E0FFEE

  2. Hochschild AR, Machung A. The second shift: working families and the revolution at home. New York, N.Y: Penguin Books; 2012. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/310593/the-second-shift-by-arlie-hochschild-with-anne-machung/

  3. Duflo E. Women empowerment and economic development. J Econ Literature. 2012;50(4):1051–79. https://doi.org/10.1257/jel.50.4.1051

  4. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. Goal 5: achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/gender-equality/

  5. Davis SN. Gender ideology construction from adolescence to young adulthood. Social Sci Res. 2007;36:1021–41. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2006.08.001

  6. Vespa J. Gender ideology construction: a life course and intersectional approach. Gender Soc Sage Publ. 2009;23(3):363–87. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20676785

  7. Bobbitt-Zeher D. The gender income gap and the role of education. Sociol Educ. 2007;80(1):1–22. https://doi.org/10.1177/003804070708000101

  8. Landry M, Vyas A, Malhotra G, Nagaraj N. Adolescents’ development of gender equity attitudes in India. Int J Adol Youth. 2020;25(1):94–103. https://doi.org/10.1080/02673843.2019.1590852

  9. Imperial Blue. Seagram’s imperial blue superhits music CDs. Men will Be Men. Imperial Blue; 2016. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJofDnUYPhw

  10. West C, Zimmerman DH. Doing gender. Gender Soc Sage Publ. 1987;1(2):125–51. https://www.jstor.org/stable/189945

  11. Janssens A. ‘Were women present at the demographic transition?’ A question revisited. History Family. 2012;12(1):43–9. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1081602X07000206

  12. Mason KO. Explaining fertility transitions. Demography. 1997;34(4):443–54. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3038299

  13. Clark S. Son preference and sex composition of children: evidence from India. Demography. 2000;37(1):95–108. https://doi.org/10.2307/2648099

  14. Kaur R, Vasudev C. Son preference and daughter aversion in two villages of Jammu. Econ Political Weekly. 2019;54(13). https://www.epw.in/journal/2019/13/commentary/son-preference-and-daughter-aversion-two-villages.html

  15. Kishor S. “May God give sons to all”: Gender and child mortality in India. Am Sociol Rev. 1993;58(2):247–65. https://www.epw.in/journal/2019/13/commentary/son-preference-and-daughter-aversion-two-villages.html

  16. Chun H, Das Gupta M. “Not a bowl of rice, but tender loving care”: From aborting girls to preferring daughters in South Korea. Asian Popul Stud. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1080/17441730.2021.1944408

  17. Das Gupta M, Zhenghua J, Bohua L, Zhenming X, Chung W, Hwa-Ok B. Why is son preference so persistent in East and South Asia? A cross-country study of China, India and the Republic of Korea. J Dev Stud. 2003;40(2):153–87. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220380412331293807

  18. McDonald P. Societal foundations for explaining fertility: gender equity. Demogr Res. 2013;S16(34):981–94. https://www.demographic-research.org/special/16/34/

  19. McDonald P. Gender equity in theories of fertility transition. Popul Dev Rev. 2004;26(3):427–39. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2000.00427.x

  20. Abrevaya J. Are there missing girls in the United States? Evidence from birth data. Am Econ J Appl Econ. 2009;1(2):1–34. https://doi.org/10.1257/app.1.2.1

  21. Almond D, Edlund L. Son-biased sex ratios in the 2000 United States census. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 2008;105(15):5681–82. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2311342/

  22. Fernández R, Fogli A. Culture: an empirical investigation of beliefs, work, and fertility. Am Econ J Macroecon. 2009;1(1):146–77. https://doi.org/10.1257/mac.1.1.146

  23. Knight CR, Brinton MC. One egalitarianism or several? Two decades of gender-role attitude change in Europe. Am J Sociol. 2017;122(5):1485–532. https://doi.org/10.1086/689814

  24. Brinton MC, Lee D-J. Gender-role ideology, labor market institutions, and post-industrial fertility. Popul Dev Rev. 2016;42(3):405–33. https://www.jstor.org/stable/44015658

  25. Jayachandran S. The roots of gender inequality in developing countries. Ann Rev Econ. 2015;7(1):63–88. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-economics-080614-115404

  26. Mohanraj P. Understanding Girls’ absence from school in Madhya Pradesh, India: an investigation. The University of York Women's Studies. 2010. https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/1102/2/Thesis.pdf

  27. Yu C, Zuo X, Blum RW, Tolman DL, Kågesten A, Mmari K, Meyer SD, Michielsen K, Basu S, Acharya R, Lian Q, Lou C. Marching to a different drummer: a cross-cultural comparison of young adolescents who challenge gender norms. J Adolesc Health. 2017;61(4):S48–54. https://www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(17)30331-2/fulltext

  28. Elder GH. The life course as developmental theory. Child Dev. 1998;69(1):1–12. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1132065

  29. Elder GH. Time, human agency, and social change: perspectives on the life course. Social Psychol Quart. 1994;57(1):4–15. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2786971

  30. Hill JP, Lynch ME. The intensification of gender-related role expectations during early adolescence. Boston, MA: Springer; 1983. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0354-9_10

  31. Basu S, Zuo X, Lou C, Acharya R, Lundgren R. Learning to be gendered: gender socialization in early adolescence among urban poor in Delhi, India, and Shanghai, China. J Adolesc Health. 2017;61(4S):S24–9. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2017.03.012.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  32. Banerji M, Deshpande AS. Does ‘Love’ make a difference? Marriage choice and post-marriage decision-making power in India. Asian Popul Stud. 2020;17(2):201–20. https://doi.org/10.1080/17441730.2020.1852713.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Santhya KG, Jejeebhoy S, Saeed I, Sarkar A. Growing up in rural India: an exploration into the lives of younger and older adolescents in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. Poverty Gender Youth. 2013. https://knowledgecommons.popcouncil.org/departments_sbsr-pgy/145

  34. Annual Status of Education Report Centre. Annual status of education report (rural) 2018. Annual Status of Education Report Centre. 2019. http://img.asercentre.org/docs/ASER%202018/Release%20Material/aserreport2018.pdf

  35. Public Report on Basic Education Team (India) & Centre for Development Economics (Delhi, India), editors. Public report on basic education in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press; 1999. https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Public-Report-on-Basic-Education-in-India%3B-The-in-Evans/349e8baa659a4ed791a048557323e6948c0a692a

  36. Blumberg RL. Gender bias in textbooks: a hidden obstacle on the road to gender equality in education. In: Paper Commissioned for the EFA Global Monitoring Report 2008 “Education for All by 2015: will we make it?”. United Nations educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. 2007. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000155509

  37. Desai S, Temsah G. Muslim and Hindu women’s public and private behaviors: gender, family and communalized politics in India. Demography. 2014;51(6):2307–32. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4431977/

  38. Snehi Y. Female infanticide and gender in Punjab: imperial claims and contemporary discourse. Econ Polit Weekly. 2003;38(41):4302–05. https://www.epw.in/journal/2003/41/commentary/female-infanticide-and-gender-punjab.html

  39. Vishwanath LS. Female infanticide. Econ Polit Weekly. 2004;39(22). [https://www.epw.in/journal/2004/22/special-articles/female-infanticide.html]

  40. Census India. Data highlights: the scheduled castes, census of India 2001, Uttar Pradesh. Office of the Registrar General, India. https://censusindia.gov.in/nada/index.php/catalog/27913

  41. Drèze J, Sen A. India: economic development and social opportunity. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press; 1996. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/india-economic-development-and-social-opportunity-9780198290124?cc=in&lang=en&

  42. Desai S, Dubey A, Joshi BL, Sen M, Sharif A & Vanneman R. Human development in India: challenges for a society in transition. Oxford University Press; 2010. https://econpapers.repec.org/bookchap/oxpobooks/9780198065128.htm

  43. Eswaran M, Ramaswami B, Wadhwa W. Status, caste, and the time allocation of women in rural India. Econ Dev Cultural Change. 2013;61(2):311–333. https://econpapers.repec.org/article/ucpecdecc/doi_3a10.1086_2f668282.htm

  44. Bhalotra S, & Cochrane T. Where have all the young girls gone? Identification of sex selection in India. The Centre for Market and Public Organisation, University of Bristol, UK. 2010. https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/52012/1/670109924.pdf

  45. Pande RP, Astone NM. Explaining son preference in rural India: the independent role of structural versus individual factors. Popul Res Policy Review. 2007;26(1):1–29. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40230884

  46. Klasen S, Pieters J. What explains the stagnation of female labor force participation in urban India? World Bank Econ Rev. 2015;29(3):449–78. https://doi.org/10.1093/wber/lhv003

  47. Kaur R. Gendered parenting and returns from children in contemporary India: a study of IIT students and their parents. Curr Sociol. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1177/0011392121990022

  48. Dyson T, Moore M. On kinship structure, female autonomy, and demographic behavior in India. Popul Dev Rev. 1983;9(1):35–60. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1972894

  49. Long JS, Freese J. Regression models for categorical dependent variables using Stata. College Station, Texas: Stata Press; 2001. http://investigadores.cide.edu/aparicio/data/refs/Long%26Freese_RegModelsUsingStata_2001.pdf

  50. Williams R. Understanding and interpreting generalized ordered logit models. J Math Sociol. 2016;40:1–14. https://www3.nd.edu/~rwilliam/gologit2/UnderStandingGologit2016.pdf

  51. Williams R. Generalized ordered logit/partial proportional odds models for ordinal dependent variables. Stata J. 2006;6(1):58–82. https://doi.org/10.1177/1536867X0600600104

  52. Williams R. Understanding and interpreting generalized ordered logit models. J Math Sociol. 2016;40:1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/0022250X.2015.1112384

  53. Agga GE, Scott HM. Use of generalized ordered logistic regression for the analysis of multidrug resistance data. Prevent Veterin Med. 2015;121(3–4):374–79. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.prevetmed.2015.08.015

  54. Davis SN, Greenstein TN. Gender ideology: components, predictors, and consequences. Ann Rev Sociol. 2009;35(1). https://doi.org/10.1146/ANNUREV-SOC-070308-115920

  55. Dhar D, Jain T, Jayachandran S. Reshaping adolescents’ gender attitudes: evidence from a school-based experiment in India. National Bureau of Economic Research. 2018. https://www.nber.org/papers/w25331

  56. Das MB, Mehta SK, Zumbyte I, Sasmal S, Goyal S. Does culture matter or firm? Demand for female labor in three Indian cities. Policy Research Working Paper, The World Bank. 2019. https://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-8736

  57. Zinn MB, Dill BT. Theorizing difference from multiracial feminism. Feminist Stud. 1996;22(2):321–31. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3178416

  58. Collins PH. Black feminist thought: knowledge, consciousness and the politics of empowerment. Routledge. 2000. https://uniteyouthdublin.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/black-feminist-though-by-patricia-hill-collins.pdf

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Council of Applied Economic Research, New Delhi, India

    Manjistha Banerji

  2. External Faculty Affiliate, Maryland Population Research Center and Research Affiliate, Department of Sociology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA

    Omkar Joshi

Authors
  1. Manjistha Banerji
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Omkar Joshi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Manjistha Banerji .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. POP (Protect Our Planet) Movement, New York, NY, USA

    Saroj Pachauri

  2. International Center for Research on Women (ICRW), New Delhi, Delhi, India

    Ravi K. Verma

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Banerji, M., Joshi, O. (2023). Ladka Ladki Ek Barabar? Gender Ideology Among Young Adolescents Through Adulthood in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. In: Pachauri, S., Verma, R.K. (eds) Transforming Unequal Gender Relations in India and Beyond. Sustainable Development Goals Series. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-4086-8_18

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-4086-8_18

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-99-4085-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-99-4086-8

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation